Incarceration vs. Rehabilitation The debate continues over how the law should treat those suffering from mental illnesses (Meader, 1985). All societies realize that if a person commits a criminal act, then the law will punish the offense. The question, however, is what the objective of the punishment is, or what intention the punishment has. The punishment for the criminal can be affected if a person is proven insane. The criminal defense is “a claim that the defendant did not, as a result of an existing mental disorder, have sufficient understanding of her or his actions and/or the consequences of those actions during the time they were committed” (Williams, 2003). In other words, if the person is unable to know the difference between right and wrong at the time of the crime, he or she is considered to be insane. Some may believe that criminals should be held responsible for their actions regardless. It is debated that the insanity plea should be abandoned, to prevent criminals from using such plea “consciously to escape the penalties of law” (Gale Cengage Learning, 2009). Although this is an issue, a person who does not consciously comprehend the seriousness of an action should receive further psychiatric evaluation to determine their mental sanity, prior to receiving a jail sentence. Therefore, criminals who are proven truly insane should be rehabilitated in a hospital, rather than being imprisoned, for the well being of the criminal, public, and morality of the law. Some people may believe that even if a criminal is proven insane he or she should be sent to a prison rather than to medical facility. This is due to the belief that criminals should be held responsible for their actions (Knowies, 2000). Many different Critics agree that modern criminal law is concerned more with the consequences of crime and less with moral imperatives. Some may believe that if a person commits a criminal act, that person should be convicted. In other words, insane criminals should pay the same consequence as any other person who commits the same crime and is fully aware that the action was harmful. Vatz (2010), an editor and a professor, argues that, “mental health experts are too quick to designate criminals as insane. I assert that some criminals have knowingly committed crimes while in prison to prove their insanity so that they can serve time in a psychiatric hospital rather than prison” (Vatz, 2010, p.4). He thinks that when clients are not guilty by reason of insanity, psychiatrists are letting criminals get away easy with blood on their hands. Therefore, people like Vatz believe that getting away with such a crime is outrageously invalid. According to others, this is so because, “Most defendants who are found not guilty by reason of insanity are released from mental hospitals years, if not decades, earlier than they would be had they served prison sentences” (Knowies, 2000, pg.2). This raises issues about equality and fairness in the court room. People become upset because they believe that if a crime is com